Trailer Brake question,..

[Darrin Tosh]

I am ready to head out in the morning to the Angola Rally, and my trailer brakes arent working on the 5th wheel.

I have power all the way to where the wires that go in the first hub, and that is all the time I had to work on it tonight.

Any suggestions on what to do in the morning? Pull the tire and hub? any other test that I can do?
If there is a break in the wiring on the other axle or hubs will the all of the brakes not work?

Any help is appreciated! I really don't want to make a trip without trailer brakes....

Thanks,
Darrin

 

[argve]

If you have power to the hub assembly then check the grounds for the system. The magnets in some will use the backing as the ground and others I have seen it actually have a wire coming off it that gets tagged to the trailer frame. In most cases it's the wire connections that are the problem because they get to see all the nasty stuff from the road (rain, snow - if you winter camp and such). I would start off by checking the conditions of the wires and then also look for spots that seem to have a kink in the wire about 2 inches from the connector this is because the corrosion will work it's way up the wire and it seems that when I'm starting to flop like a fish on the end of a pier in my troubleshooting I will normally find a break a couple of inches up... that is about all I can offer from this end of the computer screen.

If you have to tow down with no brakes just take it easy and we'll have a go at her in the afternoon. I'll be bringing my meter, screw drivers and some bailing wire...

 

[Agnem]

Brakes? You don't need no stinkin' brakes. All you have to do is point it towards Indiana. You shouldn't need the brakes till you get to the campground. ;p Of course, if I have the same problem, you won't hear about it, cause I'm upstairs shutting the network down.